Tuesday, 17 April 2012

Simon Collings. Do You Speak English?

Read the text below and choose the best option for the
following gaps.

Manuel had passed the fish on his way up the road. It
was eighteen to twenty (1) ………. long
and its silvery scales were covered with dirt. The gill flaps opened like two
gash wounds on the sides of its head as it (2)……….helplessly
in the gutter. Next to it a boy leaned against the railings, his rod and line
dangling out over the floating garbage and the stream of brown, stinking waste
which trickled from a pipe in the wall below. The boy wore a (3)………. pair of football shorts. He was perhaps nine or
ten years old, barefoot and grubby, and his skin was marked with insect (4)………..

The fish (5)………., then made one last convulsive leap, throwing
itself in the direction of the river, and landed on the pavement with a thud.
There it lay motionless for a moment, exhausted no doubt by the effort. The boy
looked down at it, turned and kicked it back into the gutter.

Manuel had not paid much
attention to the fish as he was preoccupied. He had just been to look at an
apartment and he was considering how he could afford the rent. Accommodation
was hard to find in the city and a place like this didn't (6)……….very
often. The apartment he and his wife were currently living in was so small
their six-year-old son had to live with his wife's parents during the week.
They had been trying to move for two years. He took out a cigarette and (7)……….against
the railing, looking down the street at the boy fishing.

Further along the quay two
figures were approaching. He watched as they wandered slowly towards him. They
looked to be in their early thirties and were obviously tourists, Americans he
would guess. The woman had shoulder-length reddish hair and pale (8)……….skin.
She was slim and athletic looking. Her partner was tall and (9)………., his stomach protruding from under his T-shirt.
He wore knee-length shorts, sunglasses and his long hair was tied in a pony
tail. They came slowly along the dusty street of warehouses. Tourists were not
uncommon in the city but they usually kept to the old port with its rococo
churches and (10)……….customs house, or took the organized cruises along the
reef. It was rare to see them in this district and Manuel assumed they were
lost.

Adapted
from http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/SpeaEngl794.shtml